Hackers Hit European, Australian Parliament Computer Networks

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The computer network of the European Parliament is under
cyberattack, and experts say the same hackers that hit the
European Union Commission last week and the French Finance
Ministry last month may be behind this security breach.

A Parliament spokesperson confirmed that the attack began this
morning (March 29), and told
European Voice, “Information technology services are working
day and night to investigate and have put in place some security
measures,” including blocking email access via Web browsers.

The spokesperson said the attackers penetrated the Parliament’s
network with the intention of “snooping around,” and added, “this
is not a couple of teenage boys hacking into the [EU]
institutions.”

In fact, the Parliament security breach shares characteristics
with a highly sophisticated and skilled attack on March 23 that
hit the
European Commission and the European External Action Service,
the executive and diplomatic bodies, respectively, of the
Brussels-based European Union (EU).

That incident came one day prior to an EU summit in which leaders
discussed the European-U.S. involvement in Libya, to which the
Russian and Chinese are opposed. Security analysts believe the
attack was launched by hackers possibly based in China.

Along with the EU attack, today’s European Parliament incident
may also be tied to an attack on the
French finance ministry, which resulted in the theft of
sensitive documents relating to the G20, a group of finance
ministers and banks from 19 countries plus the European Union.

In other high-profile hacking news, BBC
reports that the parliamentary computer of Australia's Prime
Minister Julia Gillard has been hacked, and that the attackers
may have stolen thousands of emails from Gillard and at least 10
other ministers.